
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, June 5, 1990                   TAG: 9006050114
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B-3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE: ORANGE                                LENGTH: Short

LIGHTNING STRIKES CATTLE, KILLS HALF

George Ahlfield ignored the loud crack of thunder near his Orange County home, but when he investigated the bleating of his cattle early Monday he found a gruesome scene and a financial nightmare.

Heaps of dead cows lay scattered in the field, with the surviving animals hovering nearby. Sunday night's thunderstorm cost Ahlfield 30 of his pedigreed black Angus breeding stock - about half his herd.

"This is a very severe loss. It's just one of those things a person never counts on and that you think will never happen to you," he said. "But when it does, it hurts."

Ahlfield guessed that the cattle must have huddled together when the storm set in. The lightning bolt probably jolted through the herd, killing the cattle instantly.

- Associated Press

by CNB